| Value | Meaning |
|---|---|
| DEFAULT | |
| NONE | |
| GRAY | |
| SUBPIXEL | |
| FAST | |
| GOOD | |
| BEST |
Allow the backend to degrade raster quality for speed
A balance between speed and quality
A high-fidelity, but potentially slow, raster mode These make no guarantee on how the backend will perform its rasterisation (if it even rasterises!), nor that they have any differing effect other than to enable some form of antialiasing. In the case of glyph rendering, CAIRO_ANTIALIAS_FAST and CAIRO_ANTIALIAS_GOOD will be mapped to CAIRO_ANTIALIAS_GRAY, with CAIRO_ANTALIAS_BEST being equivalent to CAIRO_ANTIALIAS_SUBPIXEL. The interpretation of CAIRO_ANTIALIAS_DEFAULT is left entirely up to the backend, typically this will be similar to CAIRO_ANTIALIAS_GOOD. CAIRO_ANTIALIAS_DEFAULT Use the default antialiasing for the subsystem and target device, since 1.0 CAIRO_ANTIALIAS_NONE Use a bilevel alpha mask, since 1.0 CAIRO_ANTIALIAS_GRAY Perform single-color antialiasing (using shades of gray for black text on a white background, for example), since 1.0 CAIRO_ANTIALIAS_SUBPIXEL Perform antialiasing by taking advantage of the order of subpixel elements on devices such as LCD panels, since 1.0 CAIRO_ANTIALIAS_FAST Hint that the backend should perform some antialiasing but prefer speed over quality, since 1.12 CAIRO_ANTIALIAS_GOOD The backend should balance quality against performance, since 1.12 CAIRO_ANTIALIAS_BEST Hint that the backend should render at the highest quality, sacrificing speed if necessary, since 1.12 Since 1.0
Specifies the type of antialiasing to do when rendering text or shapes. As it is not necessarily clear from the above what advantages a particular antialias method provides, since 1.12, there is also a set of hints: